By the Way, Meet Vera Stark: Comedy About Racism in Hollywood

Set in Hollywood over a 70-year period, the pseudo-biographical comedy By the Way, Meet Vera Stark charts fictional African-American actress and activist Vera Stark's journey from maid to '30s film star. Written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage -- whose recent works Ruined and Intimate Apparel garnered her an Obie Award and a New York Drama Critics' Circle Award respectively -- Vera's part comedy and part social commentary. Clever and illuminating, this show draws on screwball films of the 1930s and uses today's fascination with celebrity and controversy to get to the truth behind the legend -- who may never have existed in the first place.